DepEd focus on skills proposed

A group of private schools on Saturday urged the Department of Education to focus on skills-based courses in the senior high school curriculum and should produce highly employable graduates.

This was according to Ernesto Ray Adalem, secretary general of the Federation of Associations of Private Schools and Administrators, stressing that the senior high school curriculum must be aligned with other countries.

“The problem with our senior high school program is that they injected general academics and other strands such humanities and social sciences and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics,” Adalem told this reporter in a phone interview.

“The main objective is that we want to pattern senior high school on what’s happening outside the country. In Europe, many of them didn’t finish college but they completed skills-based education when they were senior high school,” he added.

Impractical track

Adalem pointed out that it is impractical to give more academic subjects to students during senior high school (grades 11 and 12) as these could be taken up when they go to college.

“The students should focus on what is required in the global workforce,” he said.

He also said that certification must be given by the industry and not by the government.

“Like for instance, if you’re a graduate of Barista, it should be the industry that will certify you, for example, Starbucks, not TESDA (Technical Education and Skills Development Authority) because that is a government, it should be a third-party industry,” he explained.

Adalem also said that senior high school graduates must be given due identity based on the specific skills framework that they achieved.

“That’s what we (at FAPSA) see that needs to be fixed in senior high school — the identity of our graduates because they are not college graduates nor TESDA graduates, but they need to be given a certification that they can work with the track that they finished,” he said.

The DepEd is currently reviewing the curriculum for senior high school, saying that this must be aligned with the skills needed in the industry.